In an Instagram post Bezos said, Today, I’m thrilled to announce I am launching the Bezos Earth Fund.
Climate change is the biggest threat to our planet. I want to work alongside others both to amplify known ways and to explore new ways of fighting the devastating impact of climate change on this planet we all share. This global initiative will fund scientists, activists, NGOs — any effort that offers a real possibility to help preserve and protect the natural world. We can save Earth. It’s going to take collective action from big companies, small companies, nation states, global organizations, and individuals.
I’m committing $10 billion to start and will begin issuing grants this summer. Earth is the one thing we all have in common — let’s protect it, together.
In September, the company announced an initiative it calls “Shipment Zero,” a pledge to reach 100 percent net zero carbon by 2040. That’s a full decade before the deadline called for in the historic 2016 Paris Agreement. Months later, the company announced it was ordering 100,000 electric delivery vans, the largest such fleet ever assembled. Amazon is also swapping plastic bubble wrap for recyclable paper and eliminating boxes through an expanding plan to ship merchandise in a single box, rather than a box within a box.